Page 14

REED

Reed lay on a bed soft as clouds and thought about La Bisou Morte. How dangerous was she, really?

Dangerous enough to destroy the air, water, and land, according to Dulce.

But Dulce was also a witch, one who could alter her appearance if she wished, considerably dangerous herself.

Before today, if he’d given witches any thought at all, he would’ve said they were fabrications used to scare their children into behaving. Clearly, he knew very little of the world of magic.

All right, he knew nothing of it.

Which begged the question, how useful could he possibly be to the heiress? Could an ignorant Glen-dwelling pauper whose only talents lay in beating a man to a bloody pulp really help to save the world?

“Not very fobbing likely,” he muttered. “But you’ve got nowhere else to go anyway, have you?”

This sudden willingness to put your life in danger couldn’t have anything to do with a certain pair of beautiful brown eyes, now, could it?

Reed waved the thought away like an irritating insect and ate the last piece of a chestnut apple pie Vesta had left on a tray for him. Its crust melted in a way that proved butter had been involved, and lots of it.

He’d had the first hot bath of his life. The first new clothing he’d ever donned. The first lambswool slippers he’d seen currently covered his feet. Though he wondered who’d worn them before him. Mr. Lumpish Pignut, no doubt.

Before Dulce could begin her quest to save the world from La Bisou Morte’s corrupt spell, there was much work to be done. And most of it—he was told—did not require his presence.

First, the deceased husband would need to be seen publicly leaving town.

Reed volunteered to help pack his things, but Vesta shooed him out of the room, insisting most of Cornelius’s belongings were already packed, given that he’d only resided in the manor for a few days before the fool impaled himself.

If Cornelius were still alive, Reed would’ve been hard-pressed not to push the deceptive toad off the roof himself, something he deserved after trying to murder Dulce.

Reed had offered to drive the carriage out of town—eager to try out a disguise—but Sylvan had looked disappointed in his cognitive skills.

“I am known around Moonglade to drive this carriage,” he’d informed Reed. “Actions that divert from the norm will only garner unwanted attention.”

“Like the lady of the house dying on her wedding night?” Reed pointed out. “I’d say that diverted pretty significantly from the norm.”

Sylvan scowled at him as he piled more of Cornelius’s trunks onto the carriage.

“You can make yourself useful by bathing,” he’d grumbled as he returned inside. “You smell of swamp gasses.”

“Thank you,” Reed called after him with an exaggerated bow. “That was exactly my intention.”

If he had known bathing could be such a phenomenal joy, Reed wouldn’t have bothered attempting to be useful at all.

The tub in his suite was the size of his and Philip’s entire house, the water miraculously hot, the rosemary, lemon balm, and calendula soaps leaving his skin soft as petals.

If it hadn’t been for his hunger—and the knowledge that Vesta had delivered a meal to his room—Reed might’ve stayed in the bath for hours.

The bed of clouds, his entire body cleaner than he had ever felt in his life, his stomach full beyond his imagining, Reed slept.

By the time he awoke, the sun had set, its fading light casting deep shadows across the luxurious room, the gold filigree along the ceiling like the teeth of some giant beast in the gathering darkness.

At the sound of horses pulling a carriage along the drive beneath his window, Reed sat, wrapping his freshly washed cloak around his shoulders, and went to meet Dulce.

He found only Sylvan driving an unpainted carriage led by a pack mule and a stranger on a massive Clydesdale horse.

The stranger called out to Lucas with a familiar feminine voice, and Reed realized the man was in fact Dulce herself.

Instead of the young and admittedly handsome appearance of her late husband, she was now disguised as a stout older farmer type with a large middle.

As she leapt from the horse, Reed heard her laugh for the first time, the sound like a summer day, sending a warm sensation along his ribcage.

“It’s as I told Sylvan,” she continued, “it only serves our purposes for the people of Moonglade to think Cornelius mad with grief. He is about to disappear mysteriously from his rooms and never be seen or heard of again, after all.”

“Still,” Sylvan grumbled, climbing down from the carriage and taking the mule by the reins, “that’s no reason to practically give away your fine horses and carriage.”

Dulce waved a hand dismissively. “The orphanage needed a new carriage. And Cornelius’s kind charity will be a distraction from his otherwise lumpish loutery once anyone finally notices he’s gone.

I—speaking as an ill-sounding Cornelius, of course—told the staff at the inn not to disturb me under any circumstances, so that should buy us quite some time before anyone comes sniffing around the manor with estate questions. ”

Reed was left amazed at how easily one could get rid of a person—if one could only impersonate them convincingly enough. It seemed to him that magic could be used for all sorts of criminal enterprises, and he hoped the Leper never gained the use of it.

“Ah, Reed!” Dulce said in a comically low voice as she noticed him standing in the doorway. Smiling as she passed, she uttered, “We depart at dawn, prepare what you must! Leave the unnecessary!”

Reed turned to Vesta and wiggled his fingers by his head, whispering, “Do the … changes affect her brain?”

Vesta pretended not to hear him, answering only, “You will find your new wardrobe outside your room, Mr. Hawthorne. And see that you do not neglect to take the elixir provided for you. That hair will never do.”

Reed pretended to notice his hair for the first time, exclaiming, “Oh, never , I quite agree.”

Over dinner, an argument erupted concerning who would accompany Dulce on her journey north. All three of the servants wanted to stay with the heiress, a fact that Reed found spoke well of her kind and generous nature.

“I’ve painted the carriage and I’m ready to travel,” Sylvan insisted. “There’s nothing more to do here that Lucas cannot do in my absence.”

“What about your gout?” Dulce asked.

“It’s fine. It’s nothing.”

She lowered her silver slowly onto a plate of radishes and poached potatoes. “And if men come with estate questions, what will Lucas tell them? Do you think they will respect the word of a mere sixteen-year-old? Or a housemaid? No offense, Vesta, but—”

Vesta ate two peas. “None taken.”

“It has to be you who gives them Cornelius’s letter of explanation,” Dulce said with finality. “And Vesta must nurse Mother’s tree with my potions in our absence. ”

“We will return in less than a week,” Sylvan tried, though Reed could see he’d given up. “No one will even notice—"

“We hope to return in less than a week, but we might not.”

Reed watched the four of them, the servants all equally worried for Dulce as she continued her meal.

“I will not put Lucas in any danger,” she vowed after a long silence, the determination in her gaze captivating Reed in the candlelight. “I promise you that, on my own life.”

“I never questioned that, Dulce, I only—”

She reached across the table and took his hand in hers. “I promise it, just the same, Sylvie.”

They left at dawn the next morning, their belongings piled onto the freshly painted carriage beneath waterproof oilskins, a foreign merchant’s insignia decorating its side.

A new knife was hidden in Reed’s boot, courtesy of Dulce, and he was disguised as said foreign merchant, having swallowed the first of the bitter elixir, which turned his hair a deep brown that perfectly matched his eyes and nothing else.

His appearance couldn’t be altered further since he was new to the elixir.

“You’d be surprised how little one is recognized with a simple change of wardrobe,” Dulce had told him, seeing his disappointment.

Dulce would travel as his wife—a position that would keep her in his presence and under his protection throughout—her enormous volume of striking blonde curls and bright green eyes setting her apart from the ‘dead’ heiress, should any who knew her notice them along the way.

A black high-collared dress hugged her curves splendidly.

Lucas sat tall in the driver’s seat, bundled in the fur-lined uniform of a foreigner’s coachman, the Clydesdale resigned as their preparations to depart were completed.

Reed doubted any would notice them as they passed through the empty streets of Moonglade, the town cloaked in a thick layer of fog, and even the crows were still asleep.

“Will your brother be all right?” Dulce asked, surprising him with her kindness. She was genuinely worried about a man she’d never met, when most of the wealthy wouldn’t spare a moment to care.

“He’ll pull through—thank you for asking,” Reed said. “I only wish he could leave that place and focus on his dreams of teaching.”

“And you?” she inquired, her arms hugging an older tome to her chest. “Do you wish to leave as well?”

“Me?” He chuckled. “I’d wish to never fight for money again. Fight only for the love of it. Freedom from debt, that would be nice.”

Dulce’s lips twitched at the corners. “I’ve never attended a ring fight before.”

“Ah, well, that’s probably a good thing for a respectable lady such as yourself.”

“Perhaps this respectable lady would quite enjoy one.”

He chuckled again, then his gaze returned to her tome. “What are you reading? ”